Chicago mayor Emanuel posts EPA’s deleted climate change page

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s response to the Trump administration pulling down its website detailing information about climate change: putting up his own.

The new section of the City of Chicago’s website, launched this weekend, pulls data from the archived Environmental Protection Agency page, noting, “while this information may not be readily available on the agency’s webpage right now, here in Chicago we know climate change is real and we will continue to take action to fight it.” Emanuel is promising to build the site out more in the coming weeks, using city resources.

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“The Trump administration can attempt to erase decades of work from scientists and federal employees on the reality of climate change, but burying your head in the sand doesn’t erase the problem,” Emanuel said.

Through both Republican and Democratic administrations in the past two decades, the EPA accepted and promoted climate change data. That changed under President Donald Trump, who’s expressed doubts about the science and already eliminated regulations put in place by President Barack Obama, and EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, who has repeatedly questioned global warming and fought environmental protections from the government he argues unfairly target businesses.

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“We are currently updating our website to reflect EPA's priorities under the leadership of President Trump and Administrator Pruitt,” a message on the “page is being updated” EPA site has read since.

Emanuel said he wants to see other cities and universities joining in preserving the data that the federal government is removing to ensure it stays public.

Emanuel, in office in 2011 after serving as Obama’s first chief of staff, has a local environmental record reducing carbon emissions and waste that he likes to tout. The new Chicago website has information about the science of climate change and its effects on the weather, human impact that has accelerated the problem and steps the federal government had been taking to reduce it.